A New Look, A New Outlook

Okay, so now is the end of week seven out of ten of my internship and though it has been bumpy, I think I am settled. I just finished my manual, and soon I will figure out how to distribute it. It is very basic but I made sure to include important points such as not cheating your customer, reinvesting profits in the business and writing plans down. If it can help one person, I will be happy. I do apologize that I haven't taken many pictures of me actually at work to show you, but I do have some photos of some other things I have been doing that I would love to share...

First, about 2 weeks ago, we traveled to the Kakamega Rainforest to relax for the weekend. We had a fabulous time and topped it off with a sunrise hike to the top of the highest hill there. Here are some scenes (of course you know I had to pose...)










And then the following week, an organization called RUSH (Reaching the Unreached through Self-Help) (http://www.rushuk.org.uk/main.php) held their annual medical day. For about 12 hours, from 6am-6pm, they distributed free medicine and had eye doctors, dentists, injections and psychians check any and everybody who came to the event. At the end of it, 1,500 people were checked and 200 teeth were pulled! It was very cool, unfortunately, I couldn't say for the entire event. That same day, the kids from Busia had their monthly foster meeting, so rushed to get my first opportunity to see them again. (These are the pictures of people registering to get checked and us packing bags of multivitamins for people to take home. Also if you look, I got a bit of a haircut, that really didn't leave much hair on my head)



Though I only got to spend about 2 hours with them, we really got to enjoy each other's company. They were really interested in seeing if I was able to remember their names, which of course I did! It was especially fun for me when I saw my namesake, Morine, who is now called Mayowa by everyone. Though its been only one year since we visited them, they all look like they had grown tremendously. We sang, ate candy and blew up some balloons at the Buckner office until it was time to go. That has got to be the most enjoyable time I have had in Kenya since, especially I was finally able to communicate with them fully. Thought that day was short, I plan to see them one more time, Aug. 3rd-7th, for their Buckner camp.

I feel definitely that whether my manual becomes a huge success or something else to add to the trash around here, this experience has taught me a lot and I feel more prepared to travel down the path God is laying out for me. Whether that keeps me in Kenya, takes me to my home in Nigeria, puts me in the remote parts of Asia or even has me to work in America, I want to be a part of the change that takes place in this world before Jesus comes. Mungu, niongoze.

Getting It Together

Okay, this is the end of Week 5 of the Internship and I think I have in mind what I will do...

First, let me tell you that I have spent the past 2 weeks visiting clients and working on portfolio analysis for my supervisor. I had the opportunity to visit a total of 5 business (a retail shop, a farmer, carpenter, tailor and a seller of something used to make alcohol) and I realized that I do not know how most of these businesses are ran! My most usefully visit was when I spent 5 hours at the retail shop talking with the owner and helping with his customers about his business and his expansion plans once he receives a loan. My other visits have not been as successful. I really get the impression that because I do not look like a foreigner, people do not believe I only want to help them. When I visited 3 of the other businesses, they seemed to scared of me. I even asked another lady three times if I could visit her and she continued to find ways to avoid me. Because I am primarily targeting the clients that are paying back their loans very poorly, I think they believe that I want to visit their businesses to find what I can repossess to get the money back. So, with that obstacle in my way and my time in Kenya slowly dewindling, I decided to produce a very basic business instruction manual. I remember how at the previous training seminar I was a part of, we covered a wide range of topics in-depth and quickly, and all of the participants only picked up one or two lessons from the entire two-day program. Because of this, I really do not want to hold my own lessons along the same line, in fact, I might not even present anything at all. I want to just create some very simple 1 to 4-page phamphlet that goes over basic essential business topics that are each backed up by Scriptures. With Scriptures, the lessons gain a tremendous amount of validity and people will be more willing to put them into practice. And if nothing else, it is a way to witness and/or strengthen the Christian walk of the people of Kakamega. And thanks to an idea from a fellow intern, I will also find and/or design some posters and phamphlets for our office about business and living positively with HIV.

Also, I have been living in Kenya for over a month now and I am really starting to enjoy it. I think I will miss it when I return home but I hope to utilize some of the lessons I have learned while living here. One of the biggest lessons, or at least biggest differences I have experience here, is how slow life is. Some days I can go to work and by the end of the day, I have done very little. Some nights I sleep over 8-9 hours! It seems that the only guaranteed thing I can look forward to each day is tea time (which is exactly 8:30am and 4:00pm everyday at work). If you know me, you know I am use to driving my car for hours each day getting to school, work or someother place. You know I took on 17 graduate hours last semester while working part-time and controlling my expenses so I could afford to come to Kenya. Now, I just sip tea and do my best to make sure each passing day is useful. I hope to take away from this experience the attitude of relaxing and getting some rest every now and again. We shall see how it goes.

One thing I read recently that really encouraged me while it seemed like I was doing nothing at work was Gal. 6:9 "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."